The present invention relates to an image recording device which simultaneously records data relating to a plurality of images.
Image recording devices which simultaneously record data for a plurality of image signals at the same time are disclosed in, for example, Japanese Laid-Open Patent Publication 2004-078946, Japanese Laid-Open Patent Publication 2002-010193, and Japanese Laid-Open Patent Publication H11-353794.
The invention disclosed in the above described Japanese Laid-Open Patent Publication 2004-078946 relates to an image data recording and replay system and method, and discloses a structure which makes it possible to input and output data continuously and to perform a plurality of inputs and outputs simultaneously while also enhancing the apparent internal data transfer speed, and with which it is possible to increase the number of inputs and outputs which are handled at the same time.
The invention disclosed in the above described Japanese Laid-Open Patent Publication 2002-010193 relates to a data recording and replay device and method, and discloses an AV server which comprises a recording medium capable of non-linear access, and a plurality of input and output processing units which perform input an output of data to and from that recording medium.
The invention disclosed in the above described Japanese Laid-Open Patent Publication H11-353794 relates to a general purpose storage device, and discloses a device which is adapted to be able to perform dubbing in a simple and easy manner between recording media of the same type and between recording media of different types.
Generally, with an image recording device which records image data to storage such as a hard disk or the like, it is desirable to make the number of inputs (the number of ports) at which it is possible to perform simultaneous image recording as great as possible, and moreover also to make the time period over which image recording is possible as long as possible. However, when recording image data which is inputted from a plurality of data ports, the transfer rate of this data is determined by “number of data ports”×“clock frequency”.
With the technical contents disclosed in the above described three publications, it is not possible to enhance the above described transfer rate.
In other words although, with the image data recording and replay system and method disclosed in Japanese Laid-Open Patent Publication 2004-078946, the storage device capacity is economized by compressing and expanding the data from input and output terminals for a plurality of channels, since the compression ratio is determined by the compression and expansion method, accordingly there has been the problem that, depending upon the states of the image data streams inputted to the plurality of ports, it has not necessarily been possible to obtain a high compression effect.
With the data recording and replay device and method disclosed in Japanese Laid-Open Patent Publication 2002-010193, although it is arranged to process data inputted within a plurality of time slots which are respectively allocated in advance to a plurality of input and output processing units, and to record this data upon a recording medium, there is no disclosure with regard to compression of the rate of data transfer by a plurality of transfer ports.
With the general purpose storage device disclosed in Japanese Laid-Open Patent Publication H11-353794, likewise, there is no disclosure with regard to compression of the transfer rate, since this invention only pertains to performing format conversion by providing bidirectional input and output ports consisting of, at least, a single connector which is connected to both an A/D converter and a D/A converter.
A feature of the present invention is to provide an image recording device which is adapted to perform recording of image data using a plurality of data ports at a substantially enhanced transfer rate, and which moreover is adapted to be able, by performing data compression, to perform image recording of a plurality of streams of image data over a long time period to a recording medium whose capacity is limited.